In a Single Half-Inning, the Mets Come Undone

Scott Hairston hit for the cycle as the Mets put up their best offensive output of the year, but they still took an embarrassing loss.Credit
Rick Wilking/Reuters

DENVER — There was something cruel about the half-inning, how it stubbornly refused to end.

Here was the damage, accrued over 35 excruciating minutes: 11 runs, 7 hits and 3 walks. Two long home runs. Four head-slapping errors. Two arguments, though no ejections. Innumerable slumped shoulders. Countless faraway stares.

The Mets’ strongest offensive output of the year, which included the 10th cycle in the history of their franchise, was nullified by an embarrassing and seemingly unending display of futility in the bottom of the fifth inning against the Colorado Rockies on Friday night at Coors Field. The Mets carried an optimistic four-run lead into the inning but then saw it wiped away, agonizingly, bit by bit, until they found themselves trailing by seven runs after the third out was recorded.

The madcap game, which featured 36 hits, finished 3 hours 47 minutes after it began, with the Mets on the wrong end of an 18-9 score line.

“It’s probably one of the most craziest games I’ve ever been a part of,” said Hairston, his lips pursed into a wry smile as he tried to describe the day’s conflicting emotions.

Hairston hit a home run to left field in the fourth that tied the game at 2-2. In the fifth, his triple helped kick-start a four-run, two-out rally that seemed to grant the Mets control of the game.

Chris Schwinden’s throwing error to first base allowed Eric Young Jr. to reach safely, giving the bottom of the fifth an appropriately inauspicious beginning.

“Throwing the ball away wasn’t what was planned,” said Schwinden, who made his first start of the year, “and it just snowballed from there.”

Young, who stole second and took third on another throwing error, scored on Jonathan Herrera’s single to right.

Carlos Gonzalaez came up next and crushed a three-run home run into the visitors’ bullpen in right-center field, pausing in the batter’s box to watch the ball’s flight.

With no outs, Manny Acosta jogged in from the bullpen to replace Schwinden, but the carnage continued. Troy Tulowitzki scored on a fielder’s choice, the first out of the inning. One batter later, Dexter Fowler pounded a ball deep into the right field stands to score another three runs. He too, paused to admire his work.

Young, up again, walked, Marco Scutaro singled, and Herrera was hit by a pitch, loading the bases. All three runners scored on Gonzalez’s hit to right field, making the score 13-6.

Miguel Batista, the third Mets’ pitcher of the inning, entered, and 33 minutes after the inning began he got Tulowitzki to fly out deep to center. A minute later, Todd Helton grounded out to first, ending the inning. The crowd of 35,103 rose to their feet, happy and amazed by what it had seen.

“You come into this ballpark, you’ve got to make pitches,” Manager Terry Collins said of Coors Field, which is known for its hitter friendly dimensions and conditions. “And if you don’t, stuff like this happens.”

The 11 runs allowed by the Mets in the inning tied a franchise high, and so did their four errors, which were sprinkled frustratingly through the half-hour. The historic incompetence sullied a game that otherwise had the potential to produce some positivity.

Hairston, who started in left field to face the left-handed starter Drew Pomeranz, drove in five runs and became the 10th Mets player to hit for the cycle. The last player to do it for the Mets was Jose Reyes in 2006.

Yet when Hairston doubled in the sixth, shortly after the butchery of the previous inning, to complete the rare feat, it seemed like a strange afterthought, something that would be difficult to celebrate, even as the Mets pulled themselves within striking distance with three more runs.

“It was great when it was happening,” Hairston said, “but when they kept scoring runs, it really wasn’t that enjoyable, to say the least.

But the Rockies were not done. Ramon Hernandez hit an opposite-field grand slam off Bobby Parnell to highlight a five-run seventh for the Rockies that gave them twice as many runs as the Mets. The Mets had another error in the inning, too, their sixth, one shy of the franchise record.

Amid the mortification, there could be culled traces of positivity, mostly on the offensive side. The Mets had 17 hits and their run total surpassed their previous high this season of seven, which they produced in their third game. Ruben Tejada, like Hairston, matched a career high with four hits.

Schwinden, meanwhile, was the first pitcher to have a go in the rotation spot of Mike Pelfrey, who will travel Monday to see Dr. James Andrews, with Tommy John surgery likely to treat a torn ligament in his elbow. Collins said he was impressed by how Schwinden settled down after giving up two runs in the first. But Schwinden was not happy with his performance.

“This wasn’t a good way to go about it, to show myself,” he said. “But hopefully I get another opportunity to do that.”

After a day of ugliness, most of his teammates would say the same about themselves.

INSIDE PITCH

Andres Torres (strained left calf) went 0 for 4 and played a full game in center field for the Mets’ Class AAA team in Buffalo, remaining on course to be activated for Monday’s game against the Houston Astros. Terry Collins hinted Friday that Torres would play center field and Kirk Nieuwenhuis would move to left.

A version of this article appears in print on April 28, 2012, on page D5 of the New York edition with the headline: 7 Hits, 4 Errors and 11 Runs: In a Single Half-Inning, the Mets Come Undone. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe